I built this table this past winter for a friend of ours who is an interior designer. She sent me a picture from a magazine and said build me this. The only guidance she gave me was that it needed to seat six and she wanted it to look old. The wood is heart pine. I found it at a place in north alabama. This company specializes in finding and remilling reclaimed lumber. They travel all ove the north and buy up old industrial buildings that are being torn down and ship it back south and resaw it to make flooring and finish lumber. They had beams sitting on the yard that were 2’x2’ and larger. you couldn’t even find that nowadays. According to this company, the trees that this lumber came from was propbably cut down over 100 years ago. Which if the tree was 100+ years old when it was cut, then you’re looking at wood from the revolutionary period. If you’ll look at the legs you’ll see that the nail holes are visible. What you can’t see and i didn’t take pictures of were the 1/2” bolt holes under the table top. There is a lot of character in this table.
I used loose tenon joinery for the legs and apron, figure 8 fasteners to attach the table top, and the bread board ends are rabbited and dadoed together.
This is the first time i really used different hand tools to finish with too. I didn’t use any sandpaper on it. All surfaces were finished with a #4 plane, my new scraper plane, and card scrapers.
With her being an interior designer, she wanted me to try a different method of color(i don’t believe in staining beautiful wood) the wood. She wanted it a little darker, something to make it match the age of the wood and not the fresh color of being recently milled. She came up with using coffe to add a little color. i took a pot of coffee and boiled it down to about a cup, very strong. It added just the right amount of color. The finish is my standard blend of pure tung oil, boiled linseed oil, and polyeurathane, 5 coats with a paste wax top coat..

It’s been a while since i posted a project, so here’s my latest. I built this for some friends, they picked out a design from pottery barn and I designed around that. She originally wanted mahogany until I priced it for her, then she wanted cherry and that was still too expensive, so we decided on maple and stain to the color she wanted. The sides and shelves are maple plywood, the doors and drawers are solid maple. I made all the molding except for the crown, it’s maple turned upside down with a small bead molding under it.
I stained it with minwax red mahogany and used wipe on poly as the finish.
On the raised panels, instead of using the balls to prevent the panel from rattleing, I used caulk. I squirted some caulk out on wax paper and let it dry, and then put it in the groove. It was fun, but I figured out that I don’t like building pieces for other people, even if they are paying for it.
Sorry about the background in the pics, I didn’t have time to set up a place to shoot it before i had to deliver it.

This project was not really mine, I just led a group of teenagers in it. For those not familiar with World Changers, it’s a mission organization that goes into low income areas with adults and student volunteers from all over the country. It is part of the North American Missions Board/Southern Baptist Convention. There are 2 goals, to perform the repairs on the house, usually painting or roofing, and spred the gospel to the owners and neighbors. This was in Birmingham, Al the week of june 9th. I was a crew chief with 9 teenagers from different youth groups. Our first project was to paint a house. We finished it before the end of the week, so we were asked to repair/rebuild an existing stair case. The stair case stringers and treads were in good shape, but the hand rails moved out in either direction about 6 inches. It was very dangerous. I took 3 teenagers from my crew and taught them stair construction. They demoed the hand rails. All we had to work with was 2X12’s. I did the ripping down to a 2X4 with a skil saw, but every other cut, drill, screw or nail was done by them. They did great and were so proud of what they accomplished, and the home owner loved it. I don’t have a before picture, but here is the after shot and one of me and the crew.
I would recommend World Changers to anyone, it was a great experience. The students worked hard, got the job done, and shared God’s love in the process.
Joey
http://world-changers.net

I built this table for the same friend I did the round table for at Christmas. She’s a good friend of ours who is a single mom whose husband passed away less than a year ago. She’s raising 2 kids by herself. She had asked me to build her a couple of pieces, the first being the round table for her daughter. This being the second one for her. She wanted something to match her “cherry” sleigh bed. I got the idea to get her 9 year son to help me. He was excited and thought that all he was going to do was watch and sweep up. He was wrong, after promising his mom not to let him near the table saw, He and I did alot of it together. From picking out the wood to jointing (he didn’t do this), planing (this was his favorite), cutting the sliding dovetails, to sanding. The only thing he didn’t help with was building the drawers and staining. He picked out and mounted the handles by himself, with just a little help. I enjoyed spending the time with him, and he’s decided he’s going to start woodworking.

The table is cherry. The dividers between the drawers are joined with sliding dovetails. The only mechanical fasteners are the screws and figure eights attaching the top to the body. The cherry came from a local tree and is the same lumber i found the .22 round in. It is stained to match her bedroom set (i only stain cherry if someone requests it and it better be for a good reason) and finished with wipe on satin poly. The drawer sides are poplar and pluged with walnut.

I was going through my pics and found this one. I made this last summer for a girl who was in our youth group. My wife and I lead a small group with the youth and this girl was in it. I’ve met very few people in my life, including adult, who have her faith and convictions. She and her family were moving and my wife wanted something special for her. So I made a small prayer box. The idea was whenever she needed support or had something troubling her, she could write it down and place it in the box and know that there was always someone praying for her.

It’s bubinga, sanded extremely smooth. I finished it with my typical tung oil, boiled linseed oil, and poly blend that I mix myself. It’s not the best pics in the world, sorry wasn’t planning on joining LJ’ back then. The inside is flocked in a maroon color, which blended very good with the reds in the bubinga. It’s a small box and the top come off, no hinges. Dovetailed jointery. There is another piece of bubinga that is fitted to the inside dimensions of the box, just to keep the lid in place.

Since I made the flat spatula’s at Christmas, I’ve been experimenting with some designs and figured out how to do regular spatulas and different types of spoons. Unlike the others, most of these aren’t made of scrap wood. because of the thickness I had to use 6/4. they are all cherry and walnut. And the plan is to make enough to sell at a local flea market next august and to sell at christmas. I have sold a few just by word of mouth. And I am considering putting a website up, just have to figure out how to do that. I use a dremel rotary tool to carve out the bowls of the spoons. Everything else is shaped with my oscillating belt sander and hand scrapers.

A friend of ours asked me to build some furniture for her and her daughter. This is the first piece and small round table with curved legs. She wanted this one in time for christmas. It’s been hard to keep the secret because my daughter and her daughter are good friends.
her bed is 25” from the floor, so the table is made to be about flush with the bed. It stands 25” tall. I got lucky and was able to make it for her from cherry. It was origanally going to be birch. I had one of my dad’s loan customers, who just happens to own a saw mill find out i build furniture. Any long under 5 feet that he can’t use he will just saw up and give me. All other cherry or walnut, he will cut up and give to me at a fraction of what i can get anywhere else. So anyone in mississippi that would like some custom sawed cherry, oak, or any other hardwood, send me a message and i’ll get you in touch with this guy. ok back to the table
It’s 25” tall, the top is just under 7/8th thick and 12”diameter. It has 3 legs, the legs are attached to the base using an equalateral triangel under the top. The corner of the triangles are cut off to the same width as the legs. If i ever build this again i will use pocket screws. the legs start at 1 1/2” wide at the top and taper on both sides and the back to about 1 1/4” at the bottom. The curve starts at about 3” up and curves out almost an inch. She wanted it stained a certain color, (I usually don’t like to color cherry or any other fine hardwoods, i love the natural colors and either let them age naturally or set them in the sun a few days to oxidize). the stain is minwax red mahogany. I wiped on 4 coats of gloss poly(she wanted gloss). rubbing down with 0000 steel wool between the coats. When i finish her table, which will have 3 drawers and be a little more detailed, i’ll post here.

If you’ll read on my bio on my main page, you’ll understand why I got into woodworking. I Had horrible kitchen cabinets when we bought our house 8 years ago. I wish I had taken before pictures to show. Imagine white cabinets. I tried to fix the problems by building new doors and adding lip molding, but I was not happy. So for about 2 to 3 years I just built my tool collection and got alot better at using them. Then one day, probably 4 months after hurricane Katrina. We had fixed all the damage to the exterior of our house, and we had some money left over. So after much convincing I talked my wife into letting me gut our kitchen, almost completly. I only left a couple of cabinets, the deal was I got to build the cabinets and get the tools I needed and she got all new appliances. She didn’t want wood cabinet, she wanted a faux finish on them (her best friend is an interior designer). So this is what I did and i took these pictures before I installed the pulls, they are bronze designer handles.
The cabinet doors are all raised panel, cove panel with a beaded inside profile on the rail and stile and european thumbnail on the outside edge. The same outside edge was used on the drawers. The finish on the doors and cabinets—, I painted them gloss white. After they dried, I used a dark walnut stain and rubbed them all down and let that dry a couple of days. On top of that I brushed on 2 coats of polyeurathane. The first coat rewets and lifts the stain and streaks it. The second coat just add protection. It gives it an antique finish. All the doors were made out of MDF to save money. It cost me less than $100 in material to build the doors. Using the european hinges cost more than making the doors (those things are $5 a pair) I have 26 doors. The hardware was bought off ebay for $1.40 apiece. At Lowe’s they were $9. Can you tell I’m try to be frugal (I have more money for tools this way). I also did all the tile work, my first time to do this too. Grand total, I spent less than $1000 on all the materials counting the hardware and pulls, tile and flooring. But this is the project that I’m probably most proud of and love for people to come to our house and see it.
I also did all the tile work. I found a wet saw at at local salvage center that came out of a Lowe’s in Biloxi, it must have been north of I-10 because there was only a little water damage on the box. It retailed for over $300 and I got it for $125. This gave my wife the idea to not only tile our kitchen but also both bathrooms. My tool addiction is forcing me to work

ok here are the spatulas i made that go along with the walnut and maple tray
one is the walnut left from the tray, one is some scrap cherry, and the other is left over bubinga. I patterned them after one that we got as a wedding gift several years ago.
I made them with a band saw and an oscilating belt sander. They are finished with miniral oil.
The story behind them is, this past friday at a christmas party we played dirty santa. Someone brought a hand made spatula as a gift. It didn’t take long for it to be stolen so many times it was finally frozen. A lady at the party suggested I make her one. I had never thought about doing that, but made the attempt. We came home and I made 2, one cherry and one Walnut. My wife took them saturday when all the girls went shopping and ended up selling 5. So I ended up making 11 total Saturday. All out of walnut, cherry and bubinga.
What you can’t tell from the pictures is that the flat part of the spatulas are actually slightly curved up, to help with scooping. I’ll try and take a better picture

I made this jewelry box as a baby gift for some friends. Made from south american mahogany, and finished with my own tung oil, boiled linseed oil, poly blend. I built it all as one piece, rounded the top over, and then sliced the lid off with my bandsaw.